Never ending night
by EscapeMYstery
Summary: Watch him die or watch her country burn to flames. Those were her options & she could not choose. "You showed me everything that is good & worth fighting for in the world when I had lost hope. I love this country as much as you do and I will die for it"


******_Disclaimer: ALL CHARACTERS FROM THE GS/GSD UNIVERSE BELONG TO THEIR RESPECTIVE OWNERS. NO ___****COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT IS INTENDED**.

**A/N: So I've had this scene stuck in my head for sometime after listening to an old song. Enjoy :)**

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He was sitting on the bed in the corner of the room. A ray of moon light streamed from the window of the ship. Only hours ago this very room was nothing more than a room, a place to sleep off the fatigue, a refuge against what was beyond the door. Now it was his prison. Normally he would have been sent to the cells in the lower part of the ship but the ship's crew vouched for him, instead suggesting sending him to his room with guards at the door preventing him from leaving.

This was it, of all the ways he imagined his death, this had never been one of them, especially not aboard the Archangel. Just the same it seemed fitting in an ironic way, _traitor_, that's what he was branded as. Years of being in the military and having faced similar charges, he knew this time, whoever had crafted this, had done it carefully. There was no way he was coming out of this alive, no one could save him, not without causing a war between nations.

The light coming from the open entrance distracted his thoughts. He was in confinement, no one was to come inside and the people on board couldn't be naïve enough to try and sneak him out. Even if that were the case, he wouldn't go.

After the glare of the light faded he recognized the slim figure that entered. It seemed they only ever got to meet under these circumstances: on opposite ends, injured, and/or of course facing death. The thought brought a bittersweet taste to his mouth. "What's the verdict?" He asked.

His captor lifter her gaze to him, amber eyes glimmering with tears sealed his fate. He only nodded, understanding how hard it was for her to accept.

"I tried talking to them, but they wouldn't listen. They have video footage of your assault and a recorded confession. You don't have an alibi other that our testaments and they refuse to accept those. They think we're covering for you. They refuse to negotiate, and if I turn my back on their advice, I'll be destroying the country. I-"

"Cagalli," he interrupted, not bearing to hear the agony in her voice. "What is the verdict?" he repeated.

There was a tremor of her bottom lip before she recollected herself. "Execution on site. They are not giving you a trial." The first pair of tears fell from her eyes and he wanted nothing more than to wipe them off and tell her that everything would be alright.

She looked down before raising her head up pleadingly. "If I refuse, war will break and both Bloody Valentines will seem a playground compare to this." The overwhelming pain brought her to her knees.

"I can't protect you." It broke her heart to admit it.

_We'll protect each other._

They had made that promise on the Eve of the first Bloody Valentine, when both of them had lost family, comrades, and above all, faith in humanity. Despite it all, they had had each other. They would protect each other in the battlefield and now she couldn't save him from a couple of politicians.

Watch him die or watch her country burn to flames. Those were her options and she could not choose. She couldn't protect the things she held dear, either way she would lose. She stared at the floor as her fists made contact with it again and again, tears streaming like an open facet. She was angry, angry at the idiots in Ob, at the council in PLANTS, at Kira and Lacus for not using their connections to interfere.

Her hands were abruptly stopped from taking another blow to the ground and she was lifted to her feet. Athrun, he was there standing next to her. Suddenly her anger found a new target and she proceeded to knock him off balance. She was angry at Athrun for acting like he wasn't about to die, like she hadn't just let him down and was sending him to his graveyard. Above all, she was mad at herself because she was powerless. Because she couldn't keep her promise to him. Her blows weakened until they came to a stop. Her body hovered over his beaten form. He hadn't resisted and the evidence was clear on his face. "I don't know what to do," she confessed. "I can't choose." She let out a primal cry and was engulfed by his embrace. She clung onto his military coat and continued to cry. She was losing everyone she ever held dear, her father, Kisaka, Myrna, she couldn't take losing more than she had already. "I can't choose, I won't." She repeated.

He kissed her forehead. "No one's asking you to." He replied softly before gently pulling her away. He pushed a strand of hair behind her earlobe in a comforting matter before rising from the floor. He took a seat on the bed across from her, breaking the contact that was making him lose focus. He pressed both hands together and crouched forward, thinking of the best course of action.

"Cagalli, you can't let Orb be destroyed, it's your legacy, the one your father entrust you with. You can't turn your back on that. It's not just Orb anymore. It's-"

"At what price!" Cagalli rose to a stance. "I can't just stand back and watch you die for my country. You're innocent. I won't watch an innocent man be slaughter because it's fit for politics."

Athrun raised his voice to match Cagalli's, "I am a soldier before a man, like you are Orb's representative before a woman." He paused, waiting for her to see reason, to realize this was futile. "I will die for the country I swore to protect. I won't be the first or last soldier to do so because we have faith that our leaders will guide us to a better future. If you don't agree with it then don't make my death be in vain."

Silence filled the room. Athrun knew Cagalli needed to come to terms with his inevitable death. He had to prepare her so she could move forward but he also wanted her to understand why he had to do this, why he would do this. "I can't protect you either," he admitted. "But I can protect the country that you love."

A new set of tears emerged in Caglli's eyes. "If only…" she stopped herself, knowing there was no point in going there.

Athrun lowered his head and let out a sigh knowing what she meant. He, himself had pondered on that thought many times, always coming to the same conclusion. "If only I wasn't a soldier and you weren't Orb's representative, if only your father wasn't Lord Uzumi Attha of Orb and mine Chairman Patrick Zala of PLANTS, if only you weren't a Natural or I a Coodinator." He lifted his head and locked his gaze with hers. "If none of those things were true, we would have never crossed paths. I wouldn't change a thing between us even if I could." He extended an arm to her and when she reached for it he pulled her closer to him wrapping his arms around her torso. He craved for the feel of her, to know she was safe in his arms.

He looked up at her standing form from his sitting position giving him a view of the stubborn strand that leaked onto her face again. He again pushed it back and looked straight into her face. Her features, though young, were rid of any trace of innocence he had seen in her when they first met at the beach. But he still saw the fire that burned in those amber orbs, though dimmed with worry. Her golden locks had grown longer from the last time he had seen her and there was a new tiny scar on the side of her head where the strand resided moments ago.

She was beautiful.

"You showed me everything that is good and worth fighting for in the world when I had lost hope. I love this country as much as you do and I _will_ die for it."

Her hands reached for his face clearing it from the mop of hair that also needed trimming. Her fingers traced his eyes, nose, jaw, and then she lifted her knees to the bed for support as she lowered herself to his eye level, successfully straddling him and resting on his lap.

They didn't speak, just stared into each other's eyes knowing no words could decipher what they were feeling.

"You will make a beautiful bride someday," he said without thinking. She had that effect on him from the moment he met her. She made him act on instinct and forget everything else.

Hurt flashed in her eyes, "Don't," she pleaded in a broken voice looking away from him. She didn't want to think of a life without Athrun.

A thought suddenly occurred to him_. He had never said it_. It had always been implied, but they never said it to each other, there hadn't been any need, but now more than anything he wanted her to hear him say it.

He reached for her jaw and turned her face to him. "I love you, you know that right?" he breathed out.

Something inside her shattered. Three words, that's all they were and yet they had the power to make her want to forget the whole world because right now the universe only consisted of her and Athrun. Nothing else mattered. No one was going to take this away from them.

She didn't trust her voice anymore so she did the only thing that could reciprocate the sentiment. She pushed herself onto him pressing her lips to his. Desperate to savor every moment they had left. She heard her ragged breath and felt the streaming tears in her face, but she didn't care. It was Athrun and with him she didn't have to hide anything. She slowly retrieved needing to catch her breath. Their temples remained pressed to each other and she opened her eyes for a brief moment needing to see him, to know that he was real.

The moonlight streaming from the window allowed her to see his face smeared in silent tears. His gaze was defiant, almost proud. _They were for her. _He was crying for her. He was going to die and what he feared was leaving her alone. He didn't want to leave her any more than she did.

"Be mine," he murmured.

It wasn't a question but Cagalli nodded a confirmation. It would always be him and no one else. "Always," she whispered back.

That was all it took for him shift their positions where she laid on the bed invitingly. He looked at her knowing that someday another man would see her and touch her like he had.

Cagalli graced her fingers to his face wiping away the tears that glimmered in the moonlight. "Always," she repeated, knowingly. A silent promise was made, there could never be another. "I love you."

He pressed himself to her and made them forget about tomorrow because they only had tonight.

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**Thanks for reading. Reviews would be much appreciated. ;) **

**I had actually planned out a story with this scene in mind but I highly doubt I'll do it because it would have been long and I don't think I have the time or drive to get it done. Basically it would have dealt with Mobile Suit Gundam SEED VS Astray (you can google/wiki it if you don't get what I mean). Carbon Humans would have infiltrated different nations and played them against each other (so the footage Cagalli mentioned would have come from a carbon copy of Athrun not him) leading Naturals and Coordinatos (maybe martians) to join forces against a common enemy. And of course between it all there would have been AxC, KxL, DxM, YxS, and MxM. I might just do drabbles of said theorized story, like why Dearka and Milly broke up, Murrue and Mu/Neo adopting Talia's son, Shinn meeting the child of that one Captain that helped him and he killed, so on and so forth. No promises though. But yeah, let me know what you thought on this one-shot.**


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